Shoes, poles and garbage: Karur's tell tale signs of celebration turning into mourning

Karur (Tamil Nadu): Mounds of shoes and chappals, crushed water bottles, torn party flags, pieces of clothes, broken poles, shreds of paper sprayed from party poppers and striking garbage of sorts.

As early morning walkers and people who ventured out to buy milk and essentials crossed the venue of the mega rally --an arterial road-- addressed by TVK chief Vijay, they could not make sense of what had happened on the previous night.

Several people, who went to sleep early or did not listen to news were shocked that as many as 38 people were killed and dozens injured.

While some videographers were filming the spot of the stampede, now barricaded by 'Police-Do Not Cross' kind of lengthy tapes and blocked to public, groups of elderly men enquired with photo-journalists present there in disbelief about the stampede.

While a TVK flag still flutters atop a highrise pole at the spot and oversized-speaker boxes and mega lights lying unattended amid a huge pile of torn party publicity material like posters, TVK workers and office-bearers do not wish to say anything about what went wrong in their plan.

A young man, who was among the crowd at the stampede spot, and who managed to safely get out of that spot after much struggle claimed that several people were pushed to a 'low-lying sewerage' close to the road margin as many tried to get out at the same time.

He regretted that what began as a 'celebration time' to hail their beloved matinee idol ended in tragedy.

"As fans were chanting Vijay's name, several did not realize that it was a stampede and that people fell down. Many who happened to place their legs on people who fell down also got tripped and fell," he told reporters.

Several people had their own claims about the cause for stampede and it is not clear what went wrong; whether it was the choice of the venue or overcrowding, which is being witnessed ever since Vijay launched his state-wide tour on September 13.

At the venue, people pushed away tin sheets used to barricade and make enclosure kind of spaces and many who climbed on to thatched roof structures nearby fell down and sustained injuries. Almost at the same time, police baton-charged to control the situation. However, people, including children, who were caught in the crowd and fell down, could not comprehend what was happening.

A senior citizen in his 70s said he has never seen so many people getting killed in a stampede at a political party's event and blamed the youths for their anxiety to somehow take a look at the actor.

Staff at the Karur government hospital themselves were rattled by the unceasing siren of ambulances bringing injured people and policemen pitched in by carrying the victims to the treatment ward.

Familes that lost their children could not just believe that they had lost their loved little ones and were inconsolable. The visuals of young men and women crying by holding his motionless children shook hearts.

According to the government, 38 persons have died. They were 12 men, 16 women and 10 children.

At the mortuary, kin of the deceased wailed through the night and the sound of the piercing sobs could be heard from the afar, even close to the entrance of the premises.

Also, police repeated lathi-charge nearly an hour following the stampede to chase away the remaining crowds from the venue.

Following the stampede, Vijay left the venue and did not meet reporters waiting at Tiruchirappalli and Chennai airports.

"My heart has broken, I am in unbearable, inexplicable pain and grief, " he said in a social media post.

The actor added that he prayed for speedy recovery of those being treated in hospitals.

He extended his sympathies to the families of "my dear brothers and sisters killed in Karur." Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin rushed from Chennai to Karur and interacted with doctors on the treatment being provided to the affected people and comforted them, and assured them of best care.

The CM reached Karur from Chennai past midnight. Authorities announced helpline numbers to reach the Karur district collect office helpdesk (04324 256306 and Whatsapp [phone]).